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"I shouldn’t"

He snorted "You shouldn’t be standing in a square in the rain Your hands shouldn’t be so cold that you can’t properly wrap the to your lungs, breathing this cold, wet air for hours on end You’re risking your health In what possible world can you do all those things and yet not have a sandwich?" He held out the waxed paper to her "Eat"

"You’re trying to browbeat e She wasn’t sure as in it--some kind of snize It was delicious, although she suspected that had er and the cold than the actual sandwich

He refilled her teacup

She sed "You’re too kind"

"No, I’ you out of a desire to assuage er excuse for a conscience To add to my sins, in defiance of all society’s rules, I wish to beco akin to kindness behind my selfish behavior"

The umbrella had slowly tilted to one side behind theun to drip on the towel--plop, plop, plop, slow and steady

"Society’s rules?" she said "When a gentleman condescends to a ruined woht be"

He straightened the uentleman"

She stared at him--at his well-made coat and the half-sandwich still wrapped in waxed paper, set off to his side "You work for a duke"

"You’re a lady who had to stoop to governessing I ame of it, but my father was a coal miner in Yorkshire I’ with my fists for a handful of years"

"You sound as if you’re from the north" But not quite He spoke in a clipped rhythm that made her think of London--fast and frenetic There was a hint of a burr there, a roll to his words But it had softened and smoothed out "But how does a miner become a…a…"

He smiled "I don’t knohat I ae of a duke’s finances I would have thought one required a certain amount of education in order to do that"

"Charity school," he said "Also, I was se, and so o into the mines She did that for years He never could keep track of all his children So when er brothers passed away, he becaot rather a better education thanoff into the distance as he spoke But for all that his words see about what he’d said--the thought of histo his father for the sake of his education, and his father not noticing--that sent a chill down her spine

"I was fourteen when they first expected o into the h to know better I had watched the e men before their time A year in thethere--the only question hether that death came slow or came on quick" He handed her another sandwich "I was athat I was enclosed on all sides So I ran away from home"

"What did you do instead?"